


Dead Men Tell No Tales

by stubliminalmessaging



Series: A.U.gust 2015 [1]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: A.U.gust, Alternate Universe - Pirate, Anal Sex, Homophobic Language, M/M, Slurs, heavily implied non-con at the very end of the first chapter, more tags to be added as this gets updated
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-01
Updated: 2015-10-01
Packaged: 2018-04-12 10:36:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4476143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stubliminalmessaging/pseuds/stubliminalmessaging
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Twenty-year-old Ian Gallagher is living a quiet life as a worker on a small fishing boat until one night his boat gets ransacked by a crew of pirates and he gets taken captive by their lusty captain. Will he find some way to escape or will he be trapped serving the captain's whims until the end of his days?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Leave No Quarter

**Author's Note:**

> here it is! my first contribution for a.u.gust 2015! this will be six or seven chapters depending on how things go once i get rolling on it. hope you enjoy! (also sorry but mickey doesn't come in until next chapter oops)
> 
> also!! there is a couple of lines at the end of the chapter where i heavily imply that the captain forces himself on ian and i'm going to put a big bold caps lock warning before that so you can skip it if you want. it doesn't take away from the story if you don't read it so feel free to skip it if it's something you're not comfortable with)

                A typical day for Ian Gallagher started at sunrise, when the boat’s cook would send a deckhand in to rattle him and the rest of the boys.

 

“Fuck off,” he’d groan as he rolled over and tried to go back to sleep but by then most of the other guys in the crew were awake and starting to get loud so he gave up and swung his legs off to the side of the bed. He quickly made his bunk and then slouched along to the kitchen, shoving playfully at the other guys in his crew as they all sat down.

 

He squirmed in his seat and nearly dumped his bowl of oatmeal in his lap when his breakfast neighbour, a big guy named Playter, poked him hard in the side.

 

“You ever going to retire those, Gallagher?” Playter asked, nodding at his tattered gray long johns. “They’ve seen some better days.”

 

“Yeah, but they’re doing what they need to,” Ian said. “They don’t look pretty, but there’s nothing wrong with them.”

 

“Next time we’re in port you should get some new ones,” Playter teased. “Right, Cap?”

 

Their captain, a scruffy old black guy named Rogers, didn’t even look up from his bowl. “I don’t care what either of you do with your pants. Makes no difference to me how new your jammies are.”

 

Playter chortled at that but dropped the topic and the conversation and nothing else of note happened during breakfast. The crew left the cook to clean up and went to go get dressed for the day.

 

The sun would be up by then and the deck of the ship would be warm. The crew would spend all morning casting nets and hauling in fish. Occasionally they horsed around on deck and threw rotting fish at each other until Cap yelled at them to cut it out.

 

Around midday, when the sun was highest in the sky, Ian would go back below deck with the rest of the crew and eat lunch, and then he’d spend his afternoon gutting and cleaning the morning’s catch. The crew was small; only about a half-dozen guys, so when they cleaned fish they did so in assembly line fashion. Two guys would cut a long slit in the underside of the fish from its belly to its jaw and then passed it along to the next set of guys. They would pack the fish with handfuls of ice, then the last couple guys would salt the fish and stack them on trays to stack in the freezer.

 

They packed their morning’s catch until they finished it or the sun went down (whichever came first) and then cleaned their tools and work area before they clopped back up above to their bunks. While they changed out of their slimy fish-smelling clothes the rest of the boys made disgusting jokes about fishy vaginas, completely aware of how gay Ian was.

 

“Jesus, Gallagher,” one of the boys would joke. “You smell like-“

 

                “Ripe pussy, I know,” Ian said, voice flat. “Not that I’d know because I’ve never smelled it because I like dicks because I’m _so_ gay. Heard it a dozen times. You gotta get some new material, man.”

 

                “Not while I still find it funny,” he shot back, throwing his sweaty shirt at Ian. He shoved it off himself and kicked it across the floor at his crewmate.

 

They finished changing out of their dirty work clothes and then took their seats in the kitchen to scarf down their dinner. By this time of night Ian was always tired and really ready to crawl into his bunk but he knew he wouldn’t sleep the night through if he did and so he forced himself to stay after dinner and help clean up. He dried the dishes while Playter washed them and helped mop the floor of the kitchen once the dishes were clean and put away.

 

“You up for a game?” one of the younger guys asked Ian as soon as he contemplated going to bed and Ian took one look at his smiling face and at the beaten deck of cards in his hand and felt like he had a game left in him. He’d sleep even sounder if he got a little more tired anyways, so he pulled a chair up to the rickety little table in the corner of the kitchen and the greenhorn dealt cards out to Ian and the other crewmate he’d managed to convince to play with him.

 

After Ian got thoroughly destroyed in three games in a row he called it quits, telling his crewmates to fuck off when they teased him for giving up so soon. He washed himself up before bed and changed back into the threadbare pants he slept in before finally crawling into bed and curling up against the wall. A couple of the guys were snoring by the time he got there but he was used to it by that point – it was practically soothing to him and together with the soft rocking of the ship that had become such a constant in his life, he was soon out cold.

 

A second later he hit the floor of the bunk cabin when he was hauled from his bed. He hit at the offending thing and received a hard blow to the back of the head that left him reeling. He could scarcely keep his eyes open much less fight back as he was dragged out of the bunk cabin with various other thrashing members of his crew. He fought a little as he was pulled unceremoniously up the stairs and out onto the deck. The night was warm but breezy and it would have been pleasant if Ian’s head wasn’t spinning.

 

Though he could barely stand up straight he was lined up against the rail of the ship with his crew. They were poked and prodded by rough-looking men who accompanied their harassment with disgusting comments. They crowded around the small crew of the fishing boat until they parted for one man, tall and grey and swathed in a battered leather coat that nearly brushed his ankles. He advanced on each member of Ian’s crew in turn, looking them over and asking them a few questions. Eventually he sneered at their inadequacy and carried on.

 

When he reached Playter the man spat on him and told him to go fuck himself, and once he wiped the thick glob of spit off his cheek he pulled a cutlass from where it was fastened to his hip and used it to spill Playter’s guts out on the deck then and there. He kicked one of Playter’s shins out hard enough that he fell to his knees and then he wiped the blood off his blade on the dying man’s shirt. He let him fall to his front on the deck and moved on to the next member of Ian’s crew.

 

The boys were quiet after that, even Rogers who had to watch his ship being ransacked and every item of value in his life either stolen or wrecked or thrown overboard carelessly. Once the leader of the band of pirates sussed out that Rogers was their captain he made him watch as his crew killed the remaining men of Ian’s crew, one by one.

 

When he got to Ian, he paused and his crew faltered as well, poised and ready to gut Ian like he had gutted so many fish. They were surprised by their captain’s hesitance and Ian couldn’t help but be confused as well.

 

The captain was a bit taller than Ian and he had to look up a bit where normally he would look down and that small disadvantage made him feel anxious. The captain reached up and gripped his jaw in one calloused hand, turning his head from side to side and narrowing his eyes as he inspected Ian.

 

“What do you do on this ship?” he asked, and Ian was surprised to hear that his voice was soft and deep, definitely not unpleasant to listen to. Ian would probably find him charming if he hadn’t just killed all of Ian’s crew except him and Rogers.

 

Ian tried to answer but he couldn’t get it out around the lump in his throat. He swallowed and tried again. “I-I’m a fisherman,” Ian said. “T-this is a fishing boat. We’re all fishermen.”

 

“Were,” the guy said with a smirk. “They _were_ fishermen. They’re just gory corpses now. Why shouldn’t I do the same to you?”

 

“Honestly, I’m not sure why you haven’t yet,” Ian said, shrugging. He figured he was going to die anyways, might as well be an insolent little shit while he was at it.

 

“Because you’re beautiful,” the captain replied, giving his face a squeeze where he still held it. He let go of Ian’s face and slid his fingers into his hair, gripping it and tilting his head back. “So young and supple...” He watched Ian’s throat move and he smirked. “Oh yes, you’ll do just fine.”

 

“Fine for what?” Ian gasped, gulping down air once the old captain let go of his hair. He coughed and collapsed back against the rail of the boat, wheezing. He choked out; “ _fine for what_?!” before the pirate spoke again.

 

“You two –“ he gestured to two burly looking members of his crew. “Take him to my chambers and lock him in there. We’re done here.”

 

The men gripped him by his upper arms and dragged him over to where they’d set up a gangplank stretching between the little fishing boat and a much larger vessel flying black sails and teeming with pirates. Ian struggled as best he could but his head was still reeling from the blow he’d received below deck. He stayed conscious just long enough to see one of the captain’s hairy crewmates stab Rogers in the chest and leave him groaning as he bled out face-down on the deck.

 

When the darkness finally receded from Ian’s brain he found himself in a dark chamber, under the deck of the pirate ship based on the rhythmic oceanic swaying he felt. He scrambled to the edge of the soft well-padded bed (feathers? Probably? His old mattress was like a rock slab compared to this) and felt around until he found a wall and eventually a door. He wasn’t surprised to find it bolted shut but he still let out a growl of frustration.

 

He could hear voices through the door and so he leaned against it and pressed his ear to it. He heard the all-too-familiar voice of the captain, his throaty laugh as he celebrated with his crewmates. Ian made to step away and go back to finding some other way to escape when something the captain said caught his attention and he felt his stomach sour and bile rise up in his throat.

 

“It took me so long, but I’ve finally found him,” the old captain said, sounding smug.

 

“Bulllshit,” one of his men laughed. “You’d fuck anything with a hole. What’s so special about this one?”

 

“Do you happen to have fucking functioning _eyes_ , Paulson?” the captain snapped. “He’s perfect. I’ve never seen one like him and I’ve definitely never _had_ one like him.”

 

“Whatever you say,” the man said and the captain scowled at him.

 

“Latrine duty for a week,” the captain said, making his crewmate groan and stomp off. A moment later the captain was laughing again with other members of his crew. “Get me a bottle of wine – I’m going to celebrate. It’s not every day we torch a ship _and_ I get a new cabin boy.”

 

Ian’s blood ran cold when he heard that. He pulled away from the door and hurried to the other end of the room, tripping once he hit the edge of the bed. He crawled over to the head of the bed where he could see tiny slits of light through the blinds in the window. He tried to yank the blinds off to slip out of the window but they were held on firmly and did not budge no matter how hard he tried to rattle them. He squinted through the nearest blind and his field of vision was flooded with orange and yellow as he took in the flaming ship before him. His entire world grew rapidly smaller the more he looked at it until he had to tear his eyes away from the sight.

 

 **IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ THE IMPLIED RAPE PASSAGE, STOP HERE**  

 

He flopped down on the bed and finally let himself cry for the first time. He didn’t stop crying when he heard the chamber door open, or when the torches in the room were lit, or when the bed dipped when the lecherous captain crawled over to him. He didn’t stop crying all that night, not when the captain rolled him over and pushed his face into the pillow and not even when he chained his ankle to the bed to keep him from trying to escape. He cried until his eyes hurt and his throat felt raw and his chest ached from sobbing and hiccupping. He soon learned that crying did nothing to make his life any better or hurt any less, so he just stopped doing it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> second chapter of this! a new character is introduced and the scene is set. enjoy!

A typical day for Ian Gallagher started when he woke up shortly after sunrise, crawling from the captain’s balmy embrace and out of bed. He’d pull on his pants and stumble through the dim cabin until he found the door. Then he’d go up on the deck and over to the rail, blearily greeting the early risers of the crew as they worked and cleaned. He’d take a piss off the deck and into the ocean, then plod down to the kitchen to get the captain’s breakfast if it was ready or wait for it to if it wasn’t.

(In the first few months of living on the ship this would have been impossible since Ian was chained to Ned’s bed. He’d been locked in the cabin all the time and had his meals brought to him and took care of his waste in a chamberpot. It was no way to live, and after he’d stopped fighting every time Ned touched him and stopped trying to escape every time the door opened, the chains had been removed and he’d been allowed some freedom.)

He’d bring Ned his breakfast on a tray and then wake the old captain up because he seldom woke up on his own before midday. He would be groggy and a bit grumpy until he ate his share, and the whole time he ate Ian would touch him and seduce him. By the time Ned pushed him down on the bed he would be full and lazy and sluggish with Ian in bed. Ned would finish with him and then get dressed and go up on deck, a randy grin on his face and a spring in his step as he began his day.

(Deep down some part of Ian learned not to hate Ned (it was probably the Stockholm Syndrome part of him, but he accepted it in favour of not being miserable all the time) and he still had times where he wished he could smash in the captain’s stupid smirking face. He also knew that there would be dire consequences for him if he were to strike Ned, so he crushed down those urges and continued to play his role as a gracious courtesan. He preferred to think of himself as that, even though Ned referred to him as a whore on a regular basis.)

He would then clean himself up after his morning tryst with Ned and spend the rest of the morning tidying the cabin and cleaning Ned’s many trinkets and trophies. He supposed, bitterly, that when he washed himself up he was cleaning another of the old captain’s trophies too. He cleaned and napped and read from the books that Ned kept on his shelves.

(The books contained tales of gallantry and adventure the likes of which Ian was unlikely to ever see trapped aboard the pirate ship. Any time anything exciting happened Ned would send him below deck and lock him in his cabin. He said it was to keep Ian safe from any unsavoury types that might make it onto their vessel, but Ian knew it was so that he would never witness Ned in such acts of savagery and cruelty as he had preformed the night he’d taken Ian captive. Ian supposed Ned probably wanted him to think of him as a benevolent businessman instead of as the vicious bloodthirsty tyrant he actually was. Ian would never forget the things he’d seen Ned do the night he took Ian and sometimes he thought he could smell the blood and treachery wafting off him.)

Sometimes Ian would get bored and wander around the ship and chat with his crewmates. He’d help the cook cut vegetables and watch the deckhands clean the ship and he’d even climbed up to the crow’s nest and took in the infinite blue ocean to every side of the ship.

(He only did that once because he’d spent so long up the ladder that he hadn’t been in the cabin when Ned had returned in search of his services. When he had returned and stammered out an apology and an explanation as to where he’d been Ned had locked him in his cabin and said he’d ‘deal with it.’ Ian never saw that crow again and the new one that had been appointed steadfastly refused to even talk to him. Ian had no doubt in his mind about exactly how Ned had dealt with it.)

After Ian wasted away his morning cleaning and wandering and napping and reading it was time for lunch and Ned came back to the cabin to coax Ian into bed again. Once that was done, he would send Ian off to get his lunch from the kitchen with what he thought was a playful swat to the behind. Ian rolled his eyes once his back was to Ned and carried on out the door and down the hall to the kitchen. Ned ate his fill and then left the rest for Ian as he got up and got dressed. He headed back up above deck and left Ian to his leftovers, rubbing a hand through Ian’s fiery hair as he left.

(In the early days Ned would have the cook only prepare him enough food for himself and Ian would have to either be sweet and affectionate to him or go without eating. He resisted for as long as he could and it was around the same time as he realized that he should stop fighting Ned that he started playing the role of eager sex object. He thought of it as more about survival than anything else and every time one of the crew or Ned called him some dirty name or another he just reminded himself of that.)

Once he had eaten, Ian cracked open the blinds on the window of Ned’s cabin, letting the cool salty air wash over him and cut the humidity of the cabin. Sometimes he enjoyed teaching himself little songs on the ukulele that Ned had gifted him after he’d pilfered it from a ship that his crew had torched. Today was not a ukulele day though, as he felt himself getting more and more lethargic and definitely not in a musical mood. Instead he stretched out on the bed and enjoyed the fresh air for a moment before he drifted off into a light sleep, like he usually did after he had eaten his lunch.

He woke with a start when he heard rustling inside the cabin not far from the door and he was reminded of a night several months ago on another boat with another crew that he had been yanked from sleep and thrust into a completely different life. This time was a lot less violent than the first time, which made sense since most men were less violent than Ned was under his demure exterior. Ian didn’t move at first, faking sleep until the thief moved closer to the bed.

He sprung up and caught the man by the arm, pulling at him and failing to take him down with his first attempt. He scrambled to his feet to properly tussle with the thief, naked as the day he was born. The man stood in the shadows but Ian could tell he paused to gawk at Ian, and Ian took advantage of the moment of hesitance. He charged forward and tangled with his foe, throwing punches and shoving at each other until they got close to the bed again. Ian got the upper hand for the first time since their fight started, tackling him down on the bed and then grappling to stay on top of him.

The light streaming in through the blinds still kept most of the cabin in shadow, but Ian could make out the thief’s face perfectly. He had dark hair and blue eyes and fair, almost bloodless skin. The colour his skin lacked was in his lips, almost bleeding with red. He wasn’t in any particular uniform, just tattered drawstring pants and a grubby sleeveless top, so Ian knew he hadn’t been on the ship long. Ned made sure to clothe his crew in the most pristine clothes that he could find on the ships he robbed. It made him feel like he provided for his men; like he wasn’t just some old tyrant running his ship to suit his whims.

That pale face flooded with colour when the thief felt the erection that Ian was sporting against his hip. Ian was intrigued by the thief’s reaction – not disgust or revulsion, but something else. He remembered seeing arousal on different men than Ned, mostly because arousal on Ned made Ian’s stomach lurch. This looked like arousal and interest on a less disgusting man than Ned, and Ian found that he liked having that expression directed at him. He ground his cock experimentally against the thief’s body, noting the quickening breathing. He smirked.

“What do you want?” Ian asked, sitting back on the thief’s boner and shifting his hips teasingly.

“Don’t talk to me,” the thief hissed, though he choked on his words and gripped desperately at Ian’s thighs. “Just... fuck me. And don’t fucking talk.”

“Alright,” Ian said, amused. He climbed back off of the man and let him scramble to get undressed while Ian went to one of Ned’s storage shelves and produced a bottle of oil from one of the drawers. He returned to the bed to find the thief naked and nothing short of stunning. He was stocky and compact, but muscular in his shoulders and arms. His stomach was soft and his legs were short and thick and perfect and given enough time and privacy Ian would do terrible terrible things to that body. Those were two things he just did not have, so when he returned to the bed he immediately ordered the thief to roll over.

He did as he was told gladly, rolling over onto his stomach and lifting up onto his hands and knees. Ian ran a hand down over the thief’s hip, cupping one round ass cheek in his hand and giving it a good squeeze. The man squirmed and made to reprimand Ian but he was moving on to dip his fingers into the wide neck of the bottle of oil and press those slick digits into him. Ian chuckled when the thief pushed back against the fingers entering him but in truth he was beyond turned on. He made quick work of getting the thief ready, listening to his grunts turn into sighs and moans and whines as he prodded and rubbed at the man’s prostate.

Once he’d had his fill of teasing the thief, Ian slicked up his own erection and got up on his knees behind him. He held his cock by the base and placed his other hand on the thief’s hip, pushing himself in until his pelvis was flush with the other man’s rear. He could feel the thief shuddering out long slow breaths as his knees trembled on the mattress. Ian ground his hips against the thief’s ass, not fucking him in any satisfying way but definitely pressing against him enough that he could barely get a word out.

The thief flopped down on his front, leaning on his elbows and biting down on his forearm. Ian finally fucked him properly, holding him tight by the hips with both hands and plowing into him. The thief was incoherent beyond bitten-off moans and half-formed pleas and Ian found he quite liked the other man like this. He didn’t know who he was or what he did or where he came from but Ian liked him all the same, maybe even loved him in this moment. (He’d never felt like he loved Ned, not even during sex. He tried not to think about what that might mean.)

The thief came first, jerking himself off feverishly and whimpering his words out into Ian’s pillow. Ian wrapped one of his arms around the thief’s torso and lifted him up, pulling him upright and kissing at the back of his neck. The man sagged back in his arms and Ian smirked against his neck, biting down on his shoulder hard as he finished inside the thief. He sucked at the man’s skin for a moment before he pulled back, smiling when he saw the bruising mark he’d left there.

Ian let the thief go, feeling light and giddy as the other man crawled away from him. He hadn’t felt this post-sex giddiness in years and had actually feared that he might lose all interest in sex after what Ned had done to him. This handsome stranger was a relief to him in so many ways, and he didn’t even know the man’s name.

He watched as the thief got to his feet and got dressed, tying the string of his trousers and then pulling his shirt on. He sat down on the side of the bed to pull on his shoes and lace them up, and Ian crawled over to him, intent on learning some basic facts about the man he’d just fucked. He’d just start with a-

“Kiss me and I’ll cut your fuckin’ tongue out,” the thief said, getting to his feet.

“W-what’s your name?” Ian asked, the first of a dozen questions he had for the man. The thief didn’t answer, leaving the captain’s cabin without another word and slamming the door behind him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this is so late, I haven't felt like writing for the past couple weeks. no smut in this update, but there will be in the next one :>

A typical day for Ian Gallagher went down in flames when he went topside to wander around the ship and breathe in some salt air and he was barred passage under deck where half of the crew’s cabins and the kitchen and the brig were.

 

A thick, tanned arm blocked Ian from getting any further. He looked up into the pirate’s face, marred with scars. He had an eyepatch over one eye which Ian thought was almost too-stereotypical, and had a scruffy beard, patchy because of his hairless scarred skin. Ian scowled once he saw the man looking down at him, brow furrowed and lip curled up in a snarl like he was just asking for a reason to pummel the captain’s whore.

 

"I want to go below deck," Ian told him.

 

"I’ll bet ya do," the pirate snorted. "Corrupt the mates with that faggoty tongue a’ yours." He paused to give Ian time to retaliate but he was so far past the crew’s homophobic remarks that he didn’t even blink. The men called him a queer whore on the daily and there was only so many times he’d heard those words from them before he was numb to the words and the sour breath that carried them. When he saw that Ian wasn’t biting, the pirate continued. "There’s a bloody flux taken half a dozen of the crew already so cap’n blocked this set’a cabins off an’ put all the boys livin’ here under quarantine effective until further notice."

 

Ian deflated a little, shoulders slumping. So much for his wandering. He turned away from the blocked-off staircase and resigned himself to exploring the much less interesting other half of the cabins. He’d explored that part of the ship more than anywhere else on the whole vessel and held no more mystery and intrigue to him than Ned’s own cabin did. He did a quick cursory walk through to the end hall of the cabin, poking his head into any open doors to find members of the rag-tag crew setting up bedrolls and arguing over provisions and bunks. A little more voracious behaviour than usual, but nothing new, Ian decided as he resolved to head back to Ned’s lavish cabin to read and nap until Ned came back or until he found something else to entertain himself.

 

Ned’s cabin was at the end of the hall with passages to the other half of the crew’s quarters to the right and left down the hallway. Ian found another guard at Ned’s door, though tall and wiry where the last one was stockier. He was bald as well, with a coarse beard that touched his collarbone. Ian tried to slip past him and found a cutlass pressed across his gut for his troubles.

 

"This is my cabin," Ian protested.

 

"No it ain’t. It’s the cap’n’s," the pirate insisted and Ian rolled his eyes.

 

"I sleep here with Ned," Ian tried again. "All my things are in there."

 

"Not anymore you don’t. Anyone could have been exposed, an’ the cap’n ain’t takin’ any chances," he replied, addressing Ian’s first point. "And when your miserable fuckin’ excuse for a ship got burned down all your shit burnt with it, dinnit? None’a what you got on this boat is yours."

 

Ian flushed in spite of himself. He tried to tell himself it was anger and not shame. "Then where am I supposed to sleep?"

 

"If I had it my way, you’d be cozying up with the rats down in the brig," the pirate replied with a frown as he looked down at Ian. "You’re the cap’n’s pet though, so he made sure we kept a bunk open for you in the other set of cabins."

 

Ian tried twice more to convince the bald man to let him through, to get a book or his ukulele or a wineskin but the man remained as resolute as a brick wall, swiftly denying Ian every time he sought to request something new. Ian eventually gave up and went off to the entrances to the not-quarantined cabins to find out what Ned had arranged for him.

 

A guard waited at either of the two doors to the other half of the crew’s quarters, armed with ledgers to record who was bunked where. Ian approached the less-threatening-looking one, a man about a head shorter than Ian with close-cropped blond hair and sunburnt cheeks and nose. He eyed Ian contemptuously and consulted his records, telling Ian to follow him with a rough gesture before he led the way down the right-facing hallway.

 

Soon enough Ian was left alone in his new cabin which he blessedly had to himself – for the moment, the gruff blond pirate told him before he’d left Ian alone. His cot was hard and his bedroll was itchy and he didn’t have any books to read but he forced himself to think of the potential positives of his new situation – after all, how could he serve Ned and his sexual whims if he wasn’t permitted to be in his cabin? Surely the captain wouldn’t lower himself to coming to the common quarters to get some dick from Ian, would he? Ian doubted he would have done it before, and now with this illness the chances of that happening were next to none... but if that was the case, what would he do on the ship? Would he be expected to fall in with the crew or would he move on to serving them the way he did Ned?

 

The week or so after he had stopped living in Ned’s cabin saw him spending a lot of time locked up in his room. It wasn’t that he didn’t think he could fight off the crew members who wouldn’t think twice about gutting him if he even looked at them, but he had yet to meet another member of the crew aside from Ned and the cook who _didn’t_ want to kill him. So for that reason he thought it better to take his safety into his own hands and just avoid interacting with any of the other men on the ship.

 

This only worked for the week because the more crewmates who were infected by the sickness, the more cabins of the ship were blocked off and the rarer spare beds became. The crew got to the point where the pirates were grudgingly agreeing to share beds and they were eyeing up Ian’s bunk longingly and fingering their daggers as he walked past. One swift knife in the back would get them one hundred percent of Ian’s bed instead of fifty percent, so Ian was always cautious when he was out and about on the ship, as much as he tried not to be.

 

The day it happened was the sixth day since Ian had been forced into the crew’s quarters and he’d just come back from breakfast when it finally happened. He scarfed down his food and hurried back to his room before one of the pirates could shank him only to find that a new pile of clothes and bedding had appeared in the corner of the room since he’d last been there. He puzzled over it for a moment before he crawled into his bunk and crawled beneath the covers, perhaps to sleep more. He didn’t know where it was they were sailing but it had been bitterly cold the past few days and the chill had kept him awake the night before.

 

Instead of sleeping though, he ended up curling up under his scratchy blanket and thinking. If the pirate who had decided he was going to share Ian’s bed hadn’t trashed Ian’s stuff and laid out his own bedroll, he didn’t plan on killing Ian right? He supposed that sooner or later he would have to share his bunk with someone and at the very least this bunk mate seemed to be someone who would put up with him instead of looking at him like they wondered what he would look like with his skin peeled off.

 

It felt like it took forever but eventually he resolved himself to thinking that this could be a good thing. Maybe he would even make a _friend_ on this god-forsaken prison of a vessel. They could talk about their lives before the ship and Ian could read for the pirate (whom he doubted knew how to read; Ned and Ian and whoever was in charge of navigation were probably the only members of the crew who knew how) and play his ukulele if he could bribe a guard into letting him retrieve it and some books from Ned’s cabin. He could have a real human connection with someone instead of the kind of hollow companionship that slavery brought. It was with this thought that he finally fell asleep, clutching at the edge of his blanket and full of hope for the first time in many months.

 

-

 

Ian woke up to a rush of frigid air in his face and he flailed instinctively, reaching for his blanket and blinking in the sparse light of his room. The candle he’d lit and put in the wall sconce earlier had probably drowned in its own wax but it had been replaced with another one which backlit his blanket thief and cast his face in shadow.

 

As soon as the pirate could see his face he recoiled, letting the blanket go and stepping back from the bunk. Ian sat up and scrubbed a hand through his hair, rubbing at his eyes until he could focus enough to squint at the pirate’s face. He could just make out the high contrast of dark hair and pale skin in the shadows. He turned his head to scoff and Ian saw the light from the sconce catch on light-coloured eyes and he clapped a hand over his mouth. This was it; he was going to die at the hands of the man he’d fucked into Ned’s mattress a few weeks ago. There was no way the guy would let him live after being confronted with him again in a less anonymous way.

 

"No way. No fucking way!" the pirate said, turning away from Ian and kicking at the wall of the cabin. "This ain’t gonna fuckin’ work."

 

"I don’t mind," Ian finally croaked, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed.

 

"That don’t really matter," the pirate fumed. "I’m not stayin’ with the captain’s whore. You got any idea what the mates’ll be sayin’ about me if I do?"

 

Ian let the insult roll right off him – wasn’t the first time, definitely won’t be the last. "Do you have any other options?"

 

The man snorted, rubbing his thumb against his lower lip. "You think I woulda come here if I had any other fuckin’ choice? Every other cabin I tried is full up."

 

"Then take the bed," Ian said, shifting and wrapping the blanket around his shoulders. He slid off the edge of the bunk to his feet. "I can take a patch of floor for the night."

 

"No," the pirate insisted, holding up a hand to halt Ian. "You stay right there. I don’t need a bed ‘cause I ain’t plannin’ on stayin’." Ian stood, leaning against the bunk for another moment before he was cowed by the pirate’s glare and climbed back into the bed. The pirate unrolled his bedroll in the corner of the cabin and then strode over to the sconce to put the torch out.

 

"Is it dark out already?" Ian asked, confused since he’d only just woken up.

 

"Yeah. You slept the day away, Cinderella," the pirate told Ian. Ian tried to puzzle out how what had happened, though he supposed that now that he wasn’t living by Ned’s orgasm schedule he’d fallen out of his sleep schedule almost immediately. "Not my fuckin’ problem, though. Light’s out means sleep, so not a fuckin’ peep."

 

"Can I at least know your name?" Ian asked, tired of fumbling with indirect addresses and vague gestures. "If we have to bunk together, at least we can be civil."

 

"You know what, Red? Don’t even worry about it," the man said, the blanket rustling in a way that Ian imagined was the other man laying down and rolling over onto his side, facing away from Ian where he’d stretched out on the floor. "I’ll be gone in the morning and I’ll find somewhere else to sleep."

 

(He wasn’t and he didn’t. His name was Mickey.)

 


End file.
